Peter Mettler explores the nature and perception of time in dazzling documentary
THE END OF TIME (Peter Mettler, 2012)
Film Society of Lincoln Center
Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center
144 West 65th St. between Broadway & Amsterdam Ave.
November 29 – December 5
212-875-5601
www.theendoftimemovie.com
www.filmlinc.comg
Beginning with air force pilot Joe Kittinger’s 102,800-foot jump from a helium balloon in 1960, experimental filmmaker Peter Mettler takes viewers on a wildly varying, cosmic, occasionally psychedelic, and always thought-provoking journey through the nature, perception, and very existence of time in his latest stunning documentary, The End of Time. The third in a trilogy following 1996’s Picture of Light and 2002’s Gambling, Gods and LSD, his latest film explores the concept of time by visiting with nuclear physicists working on the CERN particle accelerator in Switzerland, which is trying to re-create the conditions that led to the Big Bang; meeting with Jack Thompson, the only person left living on a section of Hawaii’s Big Island that has been covered in lava from a nearby active volcano; traveling through the decimation of Detroit, speaking with squatter Andrew Kemp and popular techno DJ Richie Hawtin; making a pilgrimage to Bodhgaya in India, where the Buddha found enlightenment; and saving a personal surprise for the extremely apt conclusion. “For me, the meaning of time is that we are,” CERN physicist George Mikenberg says, getting right to the point. Incorporating archival footage with original material, Mettler, who served as writer, director, editor, photographer, and sound designer, has created a unique visual language in The End of Time, reminiscent of Stanley Kubrick’s sci-fi epic 2001: A Space Odyssey, which also examined time and space, albeit in a futuristic, fictional way; Mettler, on the other hand, deals exclusively with the here and now, the present. He treats his film as if it were a carefully conceived architectural structure built out of sound, image, and spoken word, incorporating gorgeous shots of nature — particularly the sun, the moon, clouds, and vast landscapes of mountains, forests, and waters — alongside modern technology (including dazzling animation) and humanity’s thirst for knowledge, resulting in a mesmerizing, poetic cinematic experience that is wholly unpredictable and endlessly satisfying even when it confounds. Mettler even takes care in the film’s opening and closing titles, imbuing every moment with an element of, well, time.
The first half of Corneliu Porumboiu’s Police, Adjective is as dreadfully boring as Detective Cristi’s (Dragos Bucur) assignment, tailing a student, Victor (Radu Costin), who enjoys a joint with two of his friends every day after school. While Cristi wants to nail the kid’s supplier, the cop’s boss has him on a tight deadline, insisting he arrest Victor if the investigation continues to go nowhere, but Cristi strongly disagrees with putting the teenager away for up to seven years for a crime he believes will soon be abolished by the government. However, the film picks up considerably as Cristi seeks help from various contacts, getting caught up in red tape and public servants who would really rather not be bothered. And when he get called in by the chief (Vlad Ivanov from 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days) and gets a long lecture in linguistics, well, you won’t be able to control yourself from laughing out loud. Porumboiu keeps the pace very slow and very steady, but hang in there, because the end is a riot. Police, Adjective, which won the Un Certain Regard Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, screened at the New York Film Festival and at MoMA as part of the “Contenders, 2009,” series, and was Romania’s official entry for the Foreign Language Film Academy Award, is being shown December 2 at 3:00 at the Francesca Beale Theater as part of the Film Society of Lincoln Center series “Making Waves: New Romanian Cinema 2013,” which runs November 29 to December 3 and consists of works dating from 1962 to 2013 by such directors as Calin Peter Netzer, Nae Caranfil, Tom Wilson, Adrian Sitaru, Laura Capatana-Juller, Dan Pita, and Mircea Veroiul. Also on the schedule are the rest of Porumboiu’s films, including 12:08 East of Bucharest, the shorts trio Liviu’s Dream, A Trip to the City, and Gone with the Wine, and his latest, the closing-night selection When Evening Falls on Bucharest or Metabolism, which is being presented December 3 at 6:00 and will be followed by a Q&A with the director.
Douglas Sirk and Thomas Mann would be proud. In Todd Haynes’s wonderfully retro Far from Heaven, Oscar-nominated Julianne Moore is amazing as 1950s housewife Cathy Whitaker, who thinks she has the perfect idyllic suburban life — until she discovers that her husband (Dennis Quaid) has a secret that dare not speak its name. Mr. & Mrs. Magnatech they are not after all. When she starts getting all chummy with the black gardener (Dennis Haysbert), people start talking, of course. Part Imitation of Life, part Death in Venice, and oh-so-original, Haynes’s awesome achievement will have you believing you’re watching a film made in the 1950s, propelled by Elmer Bernstein’s excellent music, Edward Lachman’s remarkable photography, and Mark Friedberg’s terrific production design. Far from Heaven is screening at the Museum of the Moving Image on November 30 at 4:00 as part of the weekend series “Julianne Moore,” which pays tribute to the award-winning actress known for taking on challenging roles by showing six of her films, including the Coen brothers’ The Big Lebowski, Steven Spielberg’s The Lost World: Jurassic Park, Paul Thomas Anderson’s Boogie Nights, Haynes’s Safe, and Lisa Cholodenko’s The Kids Are All Right.
Unable to resist revisiting the characters who first fell in love in 1995’s Before Sunrise and again in 2004’s Before Sunset, Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy reprise their roles as Jesse and Celine, respectively, in Richard Linklater’s absolutely wonderful Before Midnight. The couple first met on a train to Vienna in 1994, talking at length about their hopes and desires and planning on getting together in six months’ time, but they don’t reconnect for another nine years, when Celine comes to one of Jesse’s book signings in Paris. In real time, they walk around the City of Light, catching up on what has happened in their lives as Jesse prepares to take a plane back home to his wife and son. And now another nine years have passed, and Jesse and Celine are living together, the parents of twins (Charlotte and Jennifer Prior). As the film opens, the divorced Jesse is putting his teenage son, Hank (Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick), on a plane after having spent the summer together in Greece. What follows is a marvelous fourteen-minute scene of Jesse driving down a mountain road as he and Celine essentially let the audience know what has occurred over the last nine years: They have twin girls (sleeping in the back), Celine has been offered an important environmental job, and Jesse is considering moving to Chicago to be closer to Hank. They return to a country estate owned by Patrick (award-winning cinematographer Walter Lassally, making his acting debut at the age of eighty-six), who is hosting an outdoor lunch with a group of friends (including French actress Ariane Labed, coproducer and filmmaker Athina Rachel Tsangari, and Xenia Kalogeropoulou, who came out of retirement to appear in her first picture since 1985). They all talk of life and love, with Celine being particularly charming. But when Jesse and Celine go off to a hotel room for what is supposed to be a romantic rendezvous, some things are said and truths revealed that complicate things.